Poachers Force Massive Rhino Evacuation

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Hundreds of endangered rhinos will be evacuated from one of the
largest national parks in Africa, according to the South African
government.

The evacuation effort aims to protect the rhinos in South
Africa's Kruger National Park from poachers, by moving the
animals away from regions of high population density to safer
areas.

The move comes in response to the country's rising problem with
illegal poaching. Last year, poachers killed a
record 1,004 rhinos in South Africa — more than double the
number slaughtered in 2011 and astronomically higher than the 13
killed in 2007, according to the Convention on International
Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). More
than 60 percent of the slaughtered rhinos lived in Kruger
National Park.

Black rhinoceros are
considered critically endangered by the International Union for
Conservation of Nature (IUCN), which means the animals face an
incredibly high risk of extinction in the wild. The IUCN
categorizes white rhinos as "near-threatened," which means they
may be at risk for extinction in the future. In total, about
21,000 rhinos from both species lived in South Africa in 2012,
South African environment minister Edna Molewa
said in a statement.

With the evacuation, officials aim to move rhinos from the park's
vulnerable eastern edge, where poaching is rampant, to safer
places across the country. Though the rhinos' final homes haven't
been decided yet, the government is considering other national
and provincial parks, safer spots in
Kruger National Park, private reserves, and even other
countries. The evacuation will also break up dense rhino
populations into less populous groups; the dense groups face
higher mortality rates and breeding pressures, Molewa said.

"The complimentary approach of strategic relocations from the
Kruger National Park and the creation of rhino strongholds will
allow the total rhino population size of South Africa to continue
to grow," Molewa said in a statement.

Other approaches

The government is also stepping up its use of DNA analysis to tie
rhino horn back to individual slaughtered animals, which in turn
could help officials nab poachers. The country arrested many more
poachers in the 2013/2014 financial year than in previous
periods, according to the South African Department of
Environmental Affairs. One notorious poacher, Mandla Chauke, was
sentenced to 77 years in prison, department officials said.

But South Africa has other tools to fight the poaching problem.
Last year, the government proposed selling all of its confiscated
rhino ivory, in hopes that flooding the rhino horn black market
would lower prices and reduce economic incentives for poaching.